CONSERVATIVE plans to cut the number of MPs by 10% would have a “catastrophic impact” on Wales, First Minister Rhodri Morgan and Welsh Secretary Peter Hain warned yesterday.

CONSERVATIVE plans to cut the number of MPs by 10% would have a “catastrophic impact” on Wales, First Minister Rhodri Morgan and Welsh Secretary Peter Hain warned yesterday.

The two most senior figures in Welsh Labour united to condemn the blueprint they claim would:

Slash the number of Welsh MPs from 40 to potentially just 29 or 30;

Raise the average number of people in a constituency from 56,000 to 77,250;

Result in the creation of a vast single seat in Mid Wales, possibly stretching from the English borders to Cardigan Bay;

Force the reduction of Assembly Members from 60 to 45 unless new legislation is introduced.

Mr Morgan said: “This is the Tory tear-up of the map of Wales.”

The First Minister, whose successor as Labour leader will be announced on December 1, said Wales’ isolated communities should not be bundled into larger constituencies.

He said: “[We] might find a seat that runs all the way from the English border to Cardigan Bay in order to accommodate the 77,000 across that Montgomeryshire- Merionnydd area.

“North Wales would see its representation cut from 10 to seven MPs. Now that is a massive hit for North Wales. Because North Wales is a long way from London and a long way from Cardiff, the sense of alienation from the political process would be particularly devastating.”

The Conservatives insist the plans are in a bid to cut costs and they are committed to ensuring “Wales continues to have a powerful voice in the House of Commons”.

But Mr Hain and Mr Morgan fear a reduction in the number of MPs, as proposed by David Cameron, would also have a knock-on effect for the Assembly unless new legislation was introduced to change the way its members are elected.

The Government of Wales Act requires that the constituencies from which the 40 directly-elected AMs are chosen are identical to the ones used to send MPs to Westminster.

The two men argue the Conservative proposals could result in an Assembly with just 30 constituency AMs and only 15 AMs from the top-up list.

Mr Hain said: “That will bring the Assembly membership down to 45 and I think everybody agrees that simply would not make for a fit-for-purpose legislature. With the Richard Commission, indeed, saying that the workload required 80 members, to turn the argument the other way around and actually reduce the number of Assembly members would be very, very serious...

“David Cameron’s playing an anti-political game but he’s not thought through the consequences on the Assembly.

“I just think it shows again that for the Conservative party Wales counts for nothing, just as the Tories themselves can’t count.”

Defending the present level of MPs, Mr Hain said: “MPs will continue to act in all sorts of areas, from foreign affairs, defence, taxation, justice [pensions and benefits] social security, employment law and so on. So there is no case at all as far as I am concerned for reducing the number of MPs and certainly no case for reducing the numbers of AMs in this very damaging way.”

Rejecting the argument that fewer Welsh MPs are needed following devolution, he said: “It doesn’t feel like you have less to do, to be perfectly honest.”

Mr Morgan, whose wife is Cardiff North MP Julie Morgan, added: “Being married to one, I can say, definitely, it doesn’t feel like that, no.”

Arguing that Welsh MPs now face the added challenge of scrutinising the Legislative Competence Orders (LCOs) which transfer new powers to the Assembly, he said: “What Welsh MPs have had since the LCO process came in is more work – not less work.”

He accepted that the effects of the Conservative reforms would have less of an impact in South Wales, saying: “In the M4-belt area this does not create a crisis. It creates the same level of reduction of representation as it does in England.

However: “In the Valleys and in rural Mid Wales and North Wales the effect is devastating because you cannot fit the Welsh geography into an English model.

“They just don’t have the knowledge of Wales, or Wales can be sacrificed to fit it into an English template.”

The Tory proposals have also prompted concern from the Electoral Reform Society.

The society’s chief executive, Ken Ritchie, said: “The problems are quite difficult. It simply doesn’t make a great deal of sense.

“I would question what David Cameron is trying to achieve here.”

Mr Ritchie favours larger constituencies which send several MPs selected by the Single Transferable Vote system of proportional representation to Westminster.

Disturbed that fewer MPs working in the House of Commons would result in less independence of Government, he said: “MPs certainly find they have enough things to do at the moment. There is also concern about the number of people at Westminster who are on the government payroll.

“If you reduce the size of the Commons that becomes a bigger proportion [of MPs].

“I’m not with David Cameron on this one.”

A Welsh Conservative spokesman said: “David Cameron is leading the debate about cutting the cost of politics. And as part of that agenda we believe there is a strong case for reducing the overall number of UK MPs.

“We’ve not said which seats we’d cut, but we will ask the Boundary Commission to set out detailed proposals. What we are committed to ensuring is that Wales continues to have a powerful voice in the House of Commons.”

They just don’t have the knowledge of Wales, or Wales can be sacrificed to fit it into an English template

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